Sleep It Off
by grace.lou.freebush
Summary: Following a misunderstanding with her boyfriend, Draco, Hermione rushes to the library where she promptly falls asleep.


**Long drabble/short one shot based off a prompt I saw on the Strictly Dramione Facebook page. Original prompt by dominique athena granger with a suggestion I liked by earthyophelia. I hope y'all like it!**

**Unbeta'd and not Britpicked, though I did the best I could!**

**All Harry Potter characters are, sadly, not owned by me, and I'm not making any money off this work of fanfiction. No copy-write infringement intended.**

* * *

Hermione reshelved the books she was clutching with a ferocity that bordered on violent.

Taking a deep breath, she reminded herself that taking her anger out on the books was neither fair to the inanimate objects nor conducive to resolving her temper. Plus if Madam Pince found her shoving precious books haphazardly into their slots, she'd be kicked out of her safe haven. She'd come here to calm down, and being forcibly removed would decidedly ruin that purpose.

With another deep sigh, Hermione let her shoulders droop in a facsimile of relaxation. She turned the corner around the edge of the shelf and took even, slow steps to the Transfiguration section to replace the last three tomes she'd found abandoned at her favourite table. Her shoulders inched up her neck as the tension warred against her determination to settle herself.

Once the books were housed back in their rightful places, Hermione found herself a thick text on a rare and complicated Arithmancy theory. It was not what she would consider "light reading," but she wanted something that would completely enthrall her. Something that would fill up her whole brain so that she wouldn't have room in her mind to replay her first fight with Draco-well, her first fight with Draco while they were in a _relationship_. Actually it wasn't even a fight as they hadn't actually spoken to each other about it at all, but semantics.

She didn't want to think about leaving dinner early so that she could spend some extra time before curfew with her boyfriend only to find him hiding in an alcove with Daphne Greengrass. She didn't want to hear the echo of his voice agreeing with Greengrass that she was unworthy as a Malfoy's love interest or that Astoria would much better fit the bill. She didn't want to ruminate on the feeling of her heart cracking in her chest or the little hitch in her breath that caught the two's attention or the widening of Draco's piercing, grey eyes when he realized he'd been caught.

She'd fled, ignoring Draco's calls bouncing off the stone corridors behind her, chasing after her. She'd dashed behind a tapestry into a hidden passageway, and the shouts muffled and faded as she left the man she'd only recently confessed to loving behind. It was not a shortcut, in fact the hidden walkway twisted and switchbacked innumerously before spitting her out in the wrong wing and floor to go to the library.

The journey had allowed her heartbreak to simmer into ire, though, and by the time she'd reached her table to find that incompetent students had left their mess for others to tidy up after them, Hermione was in a rage.

Focusing back on the complicated jargon in front of her, Hermione immersed herself in the numbers and theory spelled out in the thousand page text she'd chosen. The sun had set, but it was still early - dinner wasn't even over yet - and she had hours left to learn and forget.

After only a few minutes, though, Hermione shivered. It was December, three scant months after she'd become involved with Draco, and the castle was as frigid as the Scottish Highlands. Tucking her bare hands into her armpits, Hermione curled forward to conserve her body heat. She crossed one leg over the top of the other then switched them and tugged her skirt further over her knees to cover more of her bare skin.

She reached a very interesting section and forgot to move more than her fingers to turn the pages for a long while. After some time, though, the cold permeated her brain and coaxed her off to sleep, hunched over her reading.

* * *

Draco searched frantically through the castle for Hermione. When she'd caught Daphne accosting him just outside the Great Hall, he knew it looked bad, especially depending on how much she'd heard. Daphne, having become engaged to Macmillan over the summer, had been tasked by her parents to find a suitable husband for her younger sister, and she'd decided _he _was the one Astoria should marry.

While he agreed that traditionally Hermione would not be an acceptable dalliance, and his parents would much prefer a young, beautiful Pureblood girl, that wasn't what he wanted anymore. He wanted Hermione and her fantastic, wild hair, her bookish intelligence, her swottish, bossy attitude. He loved watching her tan skin flush as he riled her up and the way her lips parted over her teeth and her eyes crinkled every time he landed a witty remark that enticed her rare laughter to show itself.

So he had to find her to explain and apologize profusely for yet another of his horrendous mistakes. Would he ever deserve her?

He'd tried the library first - that was usually her place of comfort in the castle. He really hoped she wasn't hidden up in Gryffindor tower, he'd never get a chance to plead for her forgiveness if she'd sequestered herself away amongst her fellow lions.

He paced back and forth in front of the obnoxious portrait that guarded the Gryffindor common room. She prattled on and on over the most mundane topics. A couple of first or second years glanced at him and waited until his anxious path took him to the end of the corridor before whispering their password to the annoying Fat Lady and hurrying through the opening. Shortly the female Weasley stepped out.

"What do you want, Malfoy? Hermione isn't here, and you're scaring the underclassmen."

Cursing under his breath, Draco exhaled heavily.

"Are you alright?" Weasley asked, eyeing him closely. "I thought you were meeting with Hermione after dinner?"

"Yes, well," he didn't want to air their miscommunication before he had a chance to talk with Hermione, "I may have lost her and thought maybe she'd come back up here instead."

An auburn eyebrow raised skeptically. "Did you try the library?"

"Yes, of course I tried the library," he snapped, rather more angrily than he'd meant. "Sorry. I'm just worried. But I shouldn't take it out on you."

Her eyes narrowed anyway. "Try the library again. If _you're_ this worked up, that's where she'll be." With a flick of her hair over her shoulder, the witch stepped back through the portrait opening and disappeared.

Taking a deep breath through his nose, Draco turned to head back to the library to scour the shelves for his missing girlfriend.

"Chin up, lad," the obnoxious portrait called after him. "It's not over until the fat lady sings! I'll be sure to reign in my beautiful voice until then!" She giggled that high pitched laugh that grated his ears.

_Fantastic_, he thought.

* * *

Draco found Hermione slumped over her usual table, cheek pressed to chapter six of a massive book.

His gut twisted as he vacillated between relief that he'd found her and frustration that he'd missed her three hours ago. Gently lifting her head to remove the tome, he peered at the title: _Advanced Curse Breaking Theory and Arthmancy_. Of-fucking-course. But a tiny grin betrayed him, twitching at the corner of his lips.

He checked out the book with Madam Pince before going back to wake Hermione. But once he returned to her table, his heart clenched in his chest.

She was beautiful in sleep. Her hair spilled over the table and down her shoulder; her brow was soft and relaxed, her lips parted just enough to pout enticingly.

A shiver rocketed down her spine, though, jolting Draco into stepping towards her. As he approached, he felt the chill draft breeze over him. Looking closer, Hermione's frizz wafted lightly, and the hand she kept on the table - no doubt poised to flip pages in her book - was pale. Gently taking her hand, he found it to be cold as snow.

Shaking her shoulder gently to rouse her, Draco murmured her name. This elicited no more than a shifting of her body, nuzzling her face into the smooth wood of the desk, and groaning his name in her sleep. Warmth glowed in his heart, and he forgot all about his hours-long search.

"Let's get you somewhere more comfortable," Draco whispered to Hermione's sleeping form. Carefully gathering her into his arms, he could feel the chill that had sapped her warmth from her body. "And warm."

Slipping unseen through the library and halls of Hogwarts, he brought her to the dungeons. After spending nearly an hour in the Fat Lady's presence, Draco had never been more relieved that his own common room's entrance was nothing more than an indistinguishable section of corridor. Quietly intoning the password so as not to disturb Hermione, he slid through the opening, the nearly empty common room, and into his room.

Settling them first in front of the dorm's fireplace, he softly rubbed his hands over her icy skin. The back of her neck had been insulated by her thick locks, but her cheeks were chilled and the tip of her nose was red with the cold. Allowing her head to rest on his shoulder with her nose tucked against his neck, he held her loose hands up towards the warm flames until her fingers no longer resembled icicles. Wrapping his larger, slender hands around her knees, he willed his own body heat to transfer into her skin. When his palms no longer felt warm, he'd hold them up to the fire before pressing them back into the exposed skin above her socks and below her wool skirt, using slow friction to coax heat back into her limbs.

Once he felt satisfied with the warm flush of Hermione's skin, he toed off his shoes and gently untied and removed Hermione's. Gathering her back into his arms, he brought her to his bed.

Awkwardly pulling the covers back while maintaining his grip on Hermione, Draco eased them both into the twin bed. He shut the curtains tightly around them. Settling against his witch, he kissed her forehead.

"I love you," he breathed into her curls and fell asleep.

* * *

Hermione wasn't sure what awoke her, but she faded into consciousness slowly. She had the vague impression of gentle rocking and warm hands tracing her hands and legs but must have dreamed it. As her brain rebooted like the slow dial-up of her father's computer back home, she found herself roasting.

For some reason she was in her school uniform down to her robes and socks. She _never_ slept with socks on - they always seemed to end up scrunched at her ankles uncomfortably and half hanging off her feet. Blinking at her bed's curtains in the dark, she thought the shade appeared off.

Feeling well rested, more well rested than she could recall for months, she sat up to check her wand for the time. Only to be pulled back to her mattress by a restraint around her waist. Her back settled against something warm and firm.

Twisting to inspect, she found herself nose to nose with Draco. Confusion bloomed in her even as he sleepily blinked at her. It was unfair how beautiful his eyes were: pale and sharp and fringed with dark lashes that didn't even match his fair hair. Despite being half asleep, it felt like he saw straight through to her soul.

"Shhhh," he intoned before she could question what was going on. "Hermione, we're both tired. It's not a school night, and we can talk about it tomorrow. Go back to sleep." His eyes fluttered closed.

Looking over him, she realized he was still fully dressed in his Hogwarts uniform as well. His green and silver tie was adorably askew but still affixed around his neck, and his outer robes were tousled and wrinkled.

Stifling a giggle, Hermione turned to fully face Draco. The weight around her waist turned out to be his arm, and he pulled her into his chest. Slipping her hands up between them, she tugged on the knot of his tie to loosen it until the end pulled free. She unraveled the silk and tossed it out of the bed before undoing the top button of his shirt. He sighed in response, relaxing against the pillow.

Using her toes to grip the tops of her socks, she manoeuvred them down her calves and off her feet. She left them at the bottom of the bed, she'd retrieve them later, and tangled her legs with Draco's. Tucking her head under his chin, she allowed herself to drift back into unconsciousness to the feel of his tender kisses on the crown of her head.

* * *

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